In the commercial transaction between companies in the real world, not on the computer network, there is an intermediary agent such as a trading company between a supplying company (a seller) and a buying company (a purchaser). The agent determines a selling limit for an individual seller company based on its state of production capacity and quality control etc., and also determines a credit limit for a purchaser company based on its financial situation and mode of payment etc. for each transaction to promote the transaction such as settlement of draft. In other words, a large-scale commercial transaction is established by the intermediary agent such as a trading firm, which mediates an inter-business transaction through undertaking, for example, an inventory risk, and provides the so-called trading firm finance by providing a usance based on the settlement conditions and the like.
On the other hand, the electronic commerce (hereinafter abbreviated by “EC”) on the computer network, a typical example of which is the Internet, has been increasingly spreading explosively in recent years, and in the EC, a form of EC between a company and an individual client (hereinafter abbreviated by “B-to-C”) or between an individual client and another individual client (hereinafter abbreviated by “C-to-C”) is becoming popular. However, because there is no safe form of EC established yet, such troubles as a fraudulent transaction, a complaint problem, and the like has occurred frequently, which is becoming a serious social problem. Particularly EC on the Internet is characterized in that it is highly anonymous and consequently, in spite of the fact that falsification of user can readily be made, it is difficult to detect it, and thus in the present situation, EC on the Internet accompanies very high risks for a credit transaction. Compared with EC in B-to-C and C-to-C, the commercial transaction between companies (hereinafter abbreviated by B-to-B) deals with large amount of value and has potentially more risks because of delay in establishing infrastructures for a settlement part, which is referred to so-called an Internet bank or the like.
Conventional EC on an EC site for B-to-B adopts a method where users participating in EC enter into negotiations anonymously until they come to an agreement with regard to their desired terms of transaction and, once having reached the agreement, both parties make their counter party public to decide the remaining terms (for example, delivery, settlement, etc.).
Because of its simplicity, easiness, and very high speed in completing the transaction compared to the commercial transaction in the real world, EC on the network is expected to form a large market in future. However, in order to maintain this merit of EC in the case of B-to-B also, it is necessary to grasp and manage the risks in real time in performing EC.
Also, in order to operate the EC site, it is common for a company user to pay a considerable amount of participation charge to be in the EC site since it costs in establishing and operating the EC site. If EC costs relatively inexpensive than a direct transaction in the real world, it is meaningful to participate for a user who wants to participate and do EC in spite of his paying the participation charge. In the above-described form of EC for B-to-B, when a company user participates in EC for the first time, the user has a chance to be able to get acquainted and matched with many business counter parties whom the user did not know before participating in EC. This is useful for the company user, but once a promising counter-party company has been found, the significance of participating in this EC site will be reduced. Especially, if the company users can negotiate in adjusting a desired price by themselves, there may be a case where the direct transaction without EC turns out to be inexpensive than EC, owing to an extra expense in the transaction due to the participation charge for the EC site and an intermediary charge.